Re-yeast a high abv with Chimay?

No idea, but that is a really high ABV for "normal" yeast. I guess if the original yeast worked through all of that, then re-yeasting with the same should work. But, it is probably safer to use champagne yeast.

Hopefully someone smarter will chime in

What did your recipe look like?

 

By fresh Chimay yeast, do you mean from a bottle of beer? That won't be very healthy. If by fresh, you meant fresh out of a vial of WLP 500 or better yet a recently made starter, that sounds better, but you wouldn't need the whole vial. I have no experience carbonating anything this high in gravity, but I would think the easiest, low expense approach might be a quarter pack or so of rehydrated dry champagne yeast. Bottling yeast is unlikely to have a major impact on the flavor profile of the beer, and champagne yeast will stop when the simple sugars are consumed. Expect carbonation to take a while, though. These yeast are fighting an uphill battle in this high ABV environment.

 

nope.

 

Is that the actual yeast you used? The WLP 500? Or one of the other White Labs or Wyeast strains?

 

I never use yeast to carb up my big beers, mostly Belgians. Two cups of water and one cup of table sugar has always worked for me, up to 12.5% alc. Not sure above that, but I would probably just add a pinch more sugar if my beer was up around 17%.

 

I have no experience with anywhere near this high of ABV, so I'm looking at this purely from a spec sheet perspective. Why not WLP099, which is specifically used for high ABV, with a tolarance 25%.

 

You could try the Chimay yeast but I kind of doubt it will do anything. I think the Champagne yeast is your best bet. That or a keg.